Hagop Hagopian

Hagop Hagopian (1951-28 April 1988) was one of the founders of the Armenian Secret Army for the Liberation of Armenia (ASALA).

Biography
Hagop Hagopian was born in 1951 in Mosul, Iraq as Harutiun Takoshian, but he took on the nom de guerre of "Hagop Hagopian" and joined the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine when he moved to Lebanon in the 1970s. In 1975, he founded the Armenian Secret Army for the Liberation of Armenia in Beirut alongside James Karnusian and Kevork Ajemian. He ordered the assassination of diplomats from Turkey and their families to make Armenia an independent country, and he became an ally of Abu Nidal against the Palestine Liberation Organization after setting up bases in Damascus and Athens. In July 1983, 8 people were killed and 55 wounded in the bombing of a Turkish Airlines check-in-counter in Paris' Orly Airport, and his more militant faction concentrated in the Middle East and Greece; Monte Melkonian split from his militant faction due to his violence. He was shot dead by two men with shotguns while leaving his Athens apartment on 28 April 1988, and Turkish counterterrorism forces were blamed for his killing.